Whew…..success!

You may be confused by the title, but I was very relieved last night when it came time to take the Lavender Dreams soap I made on Sunday from the mold.  You see, I changed up the soap a bit this time…….previously Lavender Dreams was scented solely with lavender essential oils.  This time, I scented the soap with the same essential oil combination as I do the cream and lotion of the same name.  I’m keeping my earlier version, changing the name to Simply Lavender.  But I decided to keep the goat’s milk in this new version because I love the creaminess the milk gives to the lather.  The trick when making soap with goats milk is once you add the milk, you must work quickly to get it poured before it sets up in the pot.  I know this…..I have worked with goat’s milk soaps before…..and I have seen how quickly things will heat up once the milk is added.  Somehow, that didn’t register on Sunday.  I added the milk, stirred it well to combine……and guessing what happened next…….a little too well!  🙂

I suddenly realized I had less time than I normally have to get it out of the pot……so I was off.  I was watching it pour out of the pot almost like taffy, silently cursing myself under my breath ~ which got louder by the way when the soap left in the pan that I was cradling in my arm started really heating up.  I finally got it poured (glopped is more like it) in the mold, used my scraping spatula to smooth out the top as best I could and stepped back to wonder what in the world would come out of that mold in the next 48 hours. 

Well……..I’m happy to report, success!  Not too bad at all……here is a photo of the freshly cut Lavender Dreams soap.  These bars will be ready to use by the end of this month ~

It was quite a relief that I didn’t have to re-work this batch.  Note to self….pay attention next time I work with milk!!  🙂